Category Archives: Coffee Talk

Garage Talk

minitrampMom, in her infinite wisdom, has named this blog category. Well, not really, but she voiced the option she preferred and I really liked her reasoning. Reason. Yeah, moms are good at that some times.

See, garage talk came about in real life because once upon a time I met a princess in a garage. I sat on a mini-trampoline (at left), sucking my coffee, while the Broaddus household slept (and let me tell you, they enjoy their sleep!) and a groggy Greek princess crawled out of bed, grabbed her own coffee and joined me. We listened to the birds wake the neighborhood and then go quiet while they busied themselves with other things. We talked about writing and family, boys and men, life and fantasy. An hour in, Broaddus family still unconscious, you’d have thought we’d been friends forever, or sisters, or something.

We did that every morning that weekend. We dubbed it “garage talk” because it’s where we met, it’s where we continued to dig into each other’s soul and peek under each other’s band-aids, and giggle at the similarities that were too glaring to miss. Our discussions encompassed everything. And nothing.

It came about here because I needed a new category. “Coffee talk” was just a reminder of a friend that isn’t talking to me. The friend that coined the term. Yeah, I needed a new term. New Year, new blog—time for a change. Coffee Talk was usually a question, Garage Talk will be mostly observations.

And then there was mom’s reason…ing. Mom liked “garage talk” because different people see different things. She likened it to the garage sales she goes to with her best friend, where they are in the same garage, at the same time, but see different things. Observations are like that. The more people that see something, the more meanings or reasons that thing develops.

So… welcome to my garage. Everything is less than a dollar, nothing is returnable or exchangeable, batteries are not included, and I promise to tell you the meanings of the things I see… at least as they’re interpreted by my little girl eyes and old woman’s mind.

Traditional gypsies never had garages, but I bet they could have gone garage saling like champs!

Empty Coffee Pots

I threatened reinvention. I was serious. New year, new direction, new design.

I like new. New is shiny and fun and different. And a little scary. But hey, anything worth exploring should be a little scary, right?!

Not only is the skin of the site a little different—which could be a blog in itself but I’m going to sum it up in one sentence, “horror writer” does not have to equal black pages, dripping fonts, etc.—the guts will be as well. First up, the death of coffee talk.

Yep, I said that.

It’s time.

“Coffee Talk” was a term I originally used for two very specific people—in another world, another time, another place. Times change. People change. Long live caramel creamer and flavored coffees, but you’ll have to stop by Starbucks to get your fill from now on. This drive-through is closed.

So what’s the new category going to be called? hmmm… well, it’s going to be about strange little things. So I could go with ‘gypsy magic’. It’s going to include oddities that we take for granted, pithy things seen/heard, silliness in the face of insanity. So I could go with ‘garage talk’. It’s going to be all encompassing, yet not quite serious like the other blogs I post. So I could call it ‘awesome porch’ or as the Princess suggested, ‘from the porch.’ Yeah, it could be anything, and I have no idea what to call it yet. But even though it doesn’t have a definite title, it’s got a direction. What it won’t be is a standard question every Thursday or thick with caffeinated themes and catch phrases. What it will be is new.

And new is shiny and fun and different…

Welcome to the flip side!

Resolutions

Blah blah, new year’s, blah blah blah… whatever! I don’t want to know what your resolution is. I really don’t. I don’t care. It’s a promise to yourself, it’s for you, it’s not about me.

Of course, I am interested in knowing if you’ve ever succeeded in the past.

Not just new year’s resolutions, but self-promises in general. It doesn’t matter if it’s spoken aloud, uttered to a small circle of friends, or whispered desperately in the dark to nothing but the starlight, you’ve promised yourself something. It may have been, “I swear, if the tests come back negative I’m quitting smoking now!” It may have been, “I will not eat another dessert until I lose one size.” Or it could be something profane, silly or pertinent, “God, if you get me out of this, I’ll never fill-in-the-blank again.”

I have failed. Repeatedly. To quit smoking. I successfully stopped chewing my nails right after high school. I failed horribly at dieting, then succeeded. I’ve hit self-promised deadlines for change. But I’ve also missed them… sometimes I’ve been so far off the mark, the mark stopped talking to me.

blah blah, new year’s, blah blah blah… yeah, this is the last coffee talk of 2009. It’s been a crazy year. A good year. And 2010 will be even more so—crazy and good. There are changes coming. Reinvention. Self-promises. For the last coffee talk of the year, don’t tell me a thing. Just think about it. Think about your resolutions, your self-promises. Made at year-end or on a Tuesday in June for no good reason. You’ve made them but have you succeeded in them? Which ones? Why did you succeed or fail? And are you ready to make another one? Because the worst kind of broken promise is the one you make to yourself.

Happy New Year—see you on the other side…

*fade to black*

Tradition

This year I got presents from NBC’s Sally, Edgar Allan Poe, Trogdor, Lycos and Nicky (for no particular reason on that last one.) These were in my stocking.

Because in my family, stockings equals insanity.

The point to stockings isn’t fruit or coal, small toys and toothbrushes, like it may have been when we were children. Oh no. Now it’s insane, odd, weird and wonderful items that you find for your brothers, sister, parents, etc that scream “I’m so completely off the wall you should give me to X.” And they’re made even odder by the gift tags. You see, none of them come from anyone in the room. Well, they do, but not according to the tags. In theory, the tags are a clue to what’s inside from someone else, i.e. a chocolate bar with a million dollar wrapper would be from Donald Trump. Get it? Glittery make-up would be from Lady Gaga. Get it? Ok then…

I know, it’s strange and silly, but hey, that’s our family. And while I head off to take a nap and get ready for another 19 hours on the road (but yay! home in on the other end!), why not pass the coffee cup around… that’s right, it’s a christmas coffee talk!!  So what crazy traditions does your family have for Christmas? For that matter, if there’s nothing crazy, what traditions do you have in general. And I don’t mean stockings or ham, I mean those odd little things that make it Christmas for you. Would it still be Christmas if Uncle Ernie didn’t wear that older-than-god Santa hat and chase all the young kids around growling at them? Would it still be Christmas if grandma didn’t make her “special” eggnog? Yeah, those things… what makes Christmas for you? And so help me Gawd, don’t even try to say family, friends, good wishes, giving, or any of that other Hallmark crap!

Now excuse me, there’s a nap in order…so that I may fight old man winter, a few blizzards, some freezing rain and oh joy, ice pellets to get home for Christmas part 2. Merry HoHo, everyone!!!

I got nothing…

Not enough caffeine in the system this morning to properly complete a decent thought for coffee talk. So how about this week, YOU ask the questions? Ask whatever you want… Make it interesting, silly, fun, serious, whatever. Make it about writing, life, whatever. Oh, and blah blah blah reserve the right to not answer blah blah blah magic eight ball blah blah blah.

Happy Thursday!!